100 Years on from the Scopes Monkey Trial – evolution education then and now

The year 2025 marks the centenary of the infamous Scopes ‘Monkey’ Trial. A schoolteacher, John T Scopes, was arrested for breaking the law of the State of Tennessee, which prohibited any teaching about evolution that contradicted the story of creation ‘as taught in the Bible’. The State insisted that it was unlawful to teach ‘that man has descended from a lower order of animals.’ 

The team has produced a unit of work combining science and RE lessons to explore the impact of the trial and how the issue of evolution and creation is viewed today. The scheme employed a ‘Big Ideas’ approach to curriculum planning in order to ensure deep student learning in both subjects.  

The presentation began with an explanation of the trial and why it attracted so much attention, including the involvement of famous lawyers and national media. Several films have been made about it, which are drawn upon in the unit. 

The scheme features a role play activity based on the trial, leading on to Science input, where students engage in activities enabling them to understand the key evidence for evolution through natural selection and more recent research that uses contemporary technology. 

We continued with a sample activity from the scheme enabling participants to identify different interpretation of biblical accounts of creation in the light of evolution, perspectives from non-Christian religions / worldviews such as Buddhism and with reflections on the ethical issues of so-called ‘social Darwinism’. 

The session concluded with notes on helping students to develop their own ‘worldviews’ and why the Scopes trial is still important today, especially in relation to continuing ‘culture wars’ relating to evolution, science and some forms of religious belief. 

The whole KS3 scheme of learning, consisting of 12 detailed lesson plans, complete with supporting resources, can be found here: https://bigideasforre.org/exemplar-units-of-learning/ > Ages 11-14 > BI6 ‘The Big Picture: Exemplar 2, or downloaded directly here: ‘Evolution and/or creation: the Scopes Monkey Trial 100 years on’.  

The year 2025 is the 100th anniversary of what has come to be known as ‘The Scopes Monkey Trial’, in which a high school teacher, John Scopes, was tried for breaking the Butler Act in the US State of Tennessee. This Act made it illegal for human evolution to be taught in public (state-funded) schools. 

The trial has passed into legend, fortified by a wonderful film, Inherit the Wind (1960), which, while not claiming to be a documentary – indeed, it intentionally alters many of the facts of the case – succeeds in capturing what in many people’s minds were the key issues at stake. 

My interest is not so much in the history of the trial as in how it can be used to help students discuss issues to do with the theory of evolution and how some people find this theory sits uneasily with their religious beliefs, while others with religious beliefs are entirely comfortable with the theory. 

Few biologists would disagree with the assertion that the theory of evolution binds together all of biology at whatever spatial scale and over whatever time period. The idea of evolution had been around for a long time but what moved it from being a scientific possibility to the mainstream was when Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace independently came up with the theory of natural selection as the mechanism to drive evolution. 

Depending on the religion and the views of religious believers, the relationship between evolution and religion can be considered to be one of conflict, independence, dialogue or integration. But should the relationship between science and religion in general, or the theory of evolution and religion specifically, be examined in school science lessons? To many science educators, this raises suspicions that this is an attempt to find a way of getting religion into the science classroom for religious rather than scientific or educational reasons. However, in terms of the nature of science, part of the argument for addressing religion in the science classroom is that this can, on occasions, be useful in helping learners better understand why certain things come under the purview of science and others don’t. 

Three final points. First, my own view is that the science classroom is no place in which to discuss issues to do with the interpretation of scripture. Secondly, what we want in school science is for all students to understand the theory of evolution, not to pressurise them into accepting it. Thirdly, all students should be respected by their science teachers, even if they hold views that do not accord with mainstream science. 

Part of the Scopes Monkey Trial. On 20 July 1925, proceedings were moved outdoor because of the extreme heat. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tennessee_v._John_T._Scopes_Trial-_Outdoor_proceedings_on_July_20,_1925,_showing_William_Jennings_Bryan_and_Clarence_Darrow._(3_of_4_photos)_(2898243371).jpg